


Mikaela's Body: An AllSpark AU

by Rowena_Bensel



Series: The AllSpark AUs [1]
Category: Jennifer's Body (2009), Transformers (Bay Movies), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: (( Mikaela becomes a demon and with Megatron's help becomes a predator for predators )), (( but the canon is Jennifer's Body not TF )), Cannibalism, Canon-Typical Violence, Demonic Possession, F/F, F/M, Humanized Transformers, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Multi, Rituals, Succubi & Incubi, satanic rituals gone wrong
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 06:33:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 20,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27199231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rowena_Bensel/pseuds/Rowena_Bensel
Summary: We weren’t always like this; three bloodthirsty teens ready to horrifically kill a beloved rock band in front of a gym full of people. Used to be, not that long ago, we were our yearbook photos and myspace pages, and nothing more.Alison, Mikaela and Bee's lives changed forever when Mikaela became possessed by a demon. Cursed with an insatiable hunger and powers not fully under her control, the triad's search for a way to free her of the demon, leads them to uncovering a dark secret about their town.
Relationships: Alison Witwicky (OFC)/Bumblebee/Mikaela Banes, Asami Stark (OFC)/Megatron, Megatron (Transformers)/Original Female Character(s), Original Female Character(s)/Bumblebee/Mikaela Banes
Series: The AllSpark AUs [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1985638
Comments: 6
Kudos: 6





	1. Prologue: Prom's Surprise

**Author's Note:**

> Happy October everyone! This is an AU for AllSpark, completely based on the fact Megan Fox plays both Mikaela and Jennifer. I'll be posting 2 chapters today, then one every day for this week, until Saturday when I'll post the remaining chapters. I hope you all enjoy!

_**Devil's Kettle High School Senior Prom, April 2009** _

_They say Prom is supposed to be one of the best - if not the best - night of your high school career. All the lights, the music, dancing with your friends or your hot date, getting drunk on smuggled beers or spiked punch, all are supposed to make a memorable experience._

_I don't know if I'd call my prom my "best night", but it was certainly one none of us would ever forget…._

I grinned as I pulled on Mikaela and Bee's arms, leading them into the gym. Under the disco light, my light blue halter mermaid dress sparkled, while Bee's black suit absorbed it and Mikaela's light pink and silver strapless dress seemed to defuse it, giving her a softer, ethereal look accompanied by a glow to her skin that wasn't just the highlighter on her face. It was such a dazzling sight, I couldn't help leaning in to give her a kiss.

"Alison!" Mikaela giggled as she pulled back. "Don't ruin my makeup yet, we just got here."

"Sorry, I couldn't resist, you're so pretty." I leaned in again, only for Bee to intercept.

"Am I not pretty too?" he asked.

"You are handsome as fuck." And I planted one on him to prove it, before looking around the room. "Well, despite the theme, it's not too bad in here."

And the prom was, indeed beautifully set up, with several fake trees lining edges of the dancefloor, banners of woodland landscapes on the walls, and balloon arches in white, blue and green overhead. A banner over the stage declared the theme as "Through The Trees", and if it weren't for the fact this was our Senior prom, we might have skipped it just because of that.

We made our way into the crowd, saying hi to friends and making a beeline for the snack table, even though we had eaten before we came. The party atmosphere swept over us, and for fifteen minutes, everything seemed perfect.

Then Mr. Hosney stepped onto the stage. "Good evening, everyone!" The microphone squealed and spit static until he moved it away from his face. "Now, before we get this party started, I would like to introduce to you our band for tonight. These wonderful young men, who our town hold so dear, have taken the time out of their sold out national tour to come and play for us. Everyone, please give a warm Devil's Kettle welcome to… Low Shoulder!"

He stepped away and the crowd screamed and cheered in excitement as the rock band stepped on stage. My cup fell from my fingers as my mouth dropped in shock. Bee in contrast crushed his own, spilling his drink over his hand. But these reactions were tame compared to Mikaela, who froze with her eyes locked on the stage. She started shaking as Low Shoulder started playing, and Bee and I quickly pulled her behind a balloon pillar and wrapped her in a tight hug.

"It's okay, Mikaela," Bee said into her ear from behind her, arms wrapped around her shoulders while I had her hands clutched in my own. "You're stronger than them all now, they can't hurt you."

"I'm not shaking with fear," Mikaela said, her voice gaining a rasp like when she was hungry. "I'm shaking with rage. It's taking all I can to avoid shifting right now." She closed her eyes and squeezed my hands tight. "I want to hurt them. I want to tear them open and pull out their guts while they watch. I want to eat their still beating hearts. I want them to suffer, to scream and cry…." She looked up and her normally sky blue eyes were blood red. "I want them to feel the same pain and terror I did."

Bee and I locked eyes over Mikaela's head, and in that instant communication all long standing relationships had, we shared the same plan. It would be risky, and we would most likely never be able to have even a semi-normal life after this, but for Mikaela, there was nothing we wouldn't do.

I let go of Mikaela's hands and undid the halter of my dress, letting the left side fall forward, though staying covered by virtue of the double-sided tape my mom insisted on. I swept my hair to my right shoulder and tilted my head. "Bite me."

Mikaela's eyes widened, a faint hint of blue leaking through. "What?"

"I won't be strong enough to hold any of them down unless you bite me." I gave her a short, loving glare. "And don't even think of trying to make me stay out of it. You and Bee aren't the only ones with revenge to dish out."

She realized our plan and put a hand to my face. "Once I do that, there'll be no turning back."

Bee snorted. "Mik, if we were _ever_ going to turn back, it would have been long before this. It's you, me, and Alison, from the sandbox to the end."

Mikaela looked at him, then at me, and finally nodded. I held her gaze as she leaned in to press a light kiss on my lips, then closed my eyes as she trailed down my jaw and neck, razor fangs sinking into the juncture of my shoulder.


	2. Chapter 1: Maccaddam's Fire

_We weren't always like this; three bloodthirsty teens ready to horrifically kill a beloved rock band in front of a gym full of people. Used to be, not that long ago, we were our yearbook photos and myspace pages, and nothing more._

_Mikaela Banes, cheerleader, mechanic, and one of the most popular girls in school, even despite the fact she was out as bi and having a convict for a dad._

_Benjamin "Bee" Hummel, quarterback, and big man on campus, always helping out with different club projects or community service._

_Alison Witwicky, track team, founding member of the school's literature club, and first openly gay student in our school._

_The three of us have been together since kindergarten, playing knights and princesses on the playground. Other friends have come and gone, but no matter what, it's always come down to the three of us. Sandbox love never dies._

_Our town is called Devil's Kettle. Sounds like the home of some Satanic cult and witches, but really, it's named after a local waterfall, which was named by early Christian settlers scared of their own shadows. The first part of the falls comes from the top of a twenty foot cliff, then it slides down the slope into a hole in the ground. It's so dark you can't see inside, and it makes this gurgly, sucking sound sometimes. Every couple years, some college research team will camp out and dump stuff down the hole, trying to figure out where the water goes, but none of it's ever come up. The settlers thought it went to hell, or another dimension. Most say it's just really deep._

_Everything started on a Thursday, six months ago, back in October, when Bee came up to me and Mikaela after class let out for the day…._

"Hey, my beautiful babes," he said, slinging his arms around our shoulders.

"Hi, babe," Mikaela said, kissing his cheek while I got his other side. "You look excited."

"Just heard from Sid and Sonny that the Maccadam's is having a live band tonight. And it's open to high schoolers, we should go."

"Don't we have that bio test tomorrow?" I asked.

Mikaela rolled her eyes as she wiggled out of Bee's hold. "Alison, Mr. Benson would pass me even if I skipped, and you two are smart enough to pass without studying." She looked up at our boyfriend. "Who's playing?"

"Some indie rock band called Low Shoulder. Sid played me some of their music and it's pretty good, and I think you'd like the lead singer, he's very salty."

"Like soy sauce? Does he smell like fish?" I laughed as Bee tickled my side and jerked away from him. "Jerk."

"So what do you say, ladies?" Bee asked. "I'll pick you up at eight?"

Mikaela shot me a pouty puppy face, blinking her big blue eyes and pushing out her bottom lip in a way that made me want to bite on it. But she hadn't needed to pull out the heavy weapons, I was convinced. "Alright, let's go out."

"Yes!" Mikaela leaned in and kissed me. "We'll go to your place and pick out something cute."

"You're always cute," Bee said, and we rewarded him for the compliment.

* * *

_Looking back, I wish I had stuck my ground on not going and insisted we study. Maybe the fire would have still happened, but it wouldn't be us dealing with the aftermath…._

Bee got to my house at eight, dressed to impress in his black leather jacket, jeans, and a tight yellow shirt that showed off all his muscles. Mikaela and I were almost the same size, and she always left clothes behind after sleepovers, so we mixed and matched wardrobe pieces. I was wearing my sparkly blue tunic top and grey boots with her silver belt and leggings, and Mikaela took my white boots to go with her red leather jacket, white dress and red tights. We spent a good half hour just making out in the car before we had to get out and go in for the nine o'clock show.

Devil's Kettle's only tavern was a cramped, dirty looking place packed with people, the Thursday night regulars and fifty or so high schoolers with packs of hand sanitizer and tissues to try and remove the "X"s on their hands that barred them from getting to what was the bar.

"I can't wait until we can drink without nicking from your mom's wine cabinet," Mikaela said, scrubbing at her own marks.

I snorted. "Like she doesn't know. She's just trying to be the Mean Girls mom." I looked around but couldn't see anything for all the people. "Where's the band at?"

"Over at the stage," Bee said, and I was jealous of his height advantage once again. But Mikaela and I managed to find some stools at one of the high tables and were able to hop up to see over the crowd.

The stage could barely be called that, really more a dias, but the band was setting up like they were used to it. They were definitely cooler than anyone in Devil's Kettle. Their clothes were obviously brand name, and they had gelled and styled hair and eyeliner. I wasn't into any guy but Bee, but I could definitely see the appeal for Mikaela, who looked like she was devouring the lead singer with her eyes.

"Salty, huh?" Bee asked.

"Like a whole bag of pretzels," Mikaela said. "I have to talk to him. Think they could use some groupies?"

"I think so, let's go." I took Mikaela's hand and started pushing our way through the crowd.

_God, I wish I hadn't done that. If we had just stayed in the back, maybe they wouldn't have noticed us…._

With some elbow shoving and multiple "excuse me"s, we made it to the front, and the lead singer turned towards us. I smiled, a bit nervously, and stuck out my hand.

"Hi, I'm Alison, and this is Mikaela." She stuck out her hand with me and smiled brightly.

"Nikolai Wolf," he said, shaking mine quickly, but lingering over Mikaela. "So, you two fans of the band?"

"New fans," Mikaela said. "But we just listened to all your music and it's to die for. I can't wait to hear it live."

"Well, I hope we live up to such high praise," Nikolai said, his gaze lingering on Mikaela's cleavage. I couldn't help getting a little possessive and wrapped my arm around her waist.

"So what brings you out here to Devil's Kettle?" I asked. "Most city bands don't bother to come out this far."

"We're not most bands, and we feel like our rural fans would appreciate us coming to them. Plus, with a name like Devil's Lake, who wouldn't want to play here?" I wanted to correct him but Mikaela spoke first.

"I could show you my appreciation," she said, then blushed as she realize how dirty that sounded. "I mean, I can get you guys some drinks. They got this one called 'Kettle Black' that's got brandy and cherry coke and blueberries in it."

"I love blueberries." Nikolai turned to his band. "You guys want anything?"

"Rum and coke."

"Whiskey sour."

"Scotch on the rocks."

"I'll get those right now,' Mikaela smiled and headed back to the bar.

I followed after her, though once in the crowd I asked, "How are you gonna get them drinks? Maccadam is at the bar tonight, and he's not gonna give them to you."

"Relax, Callie's right there, she'll get them for us," she said, pointing to where Bee was talking to Callie Tones, his unofficial adopted big sister. She was wearing her police academy shirt, so she probably just came in from her class.

"So, you guys met the band. What're they like?" Callie asked.

"So cool. They wanted drinks, but I can't get them. Would you be a doll and get them for me?" Mikaela gave him her pouty puppy face, and like almost everyone else, Callie caved to it.

"Oh, I can't refuse you anything, Mickey Mouse," she said, tapping her nose. "Come on." Callie headed with Mikaela to the bar, as Bee wrapped his arms around my waist.

"Were they really so cool?" he asked, and the pouty tone in his voice made me giggle.

"They were, but you know you're the only boy for me, Bee." I pushed him to sit on the stool and climbed into his lap, arms around his neck, and started kissing him.

We made out for a bit, then we heard the sound of feedback and looked up to see the band all on stage and ready to play. I could spot Mikaela standing by the side of the stage, watching them.

"Good evening, Devil's Lake," Nikolai said, and I couldn't help shouting out "Devil's Kettle!" like I'd wanted to earlier.

"You're goddamn right it is," Nikolai said, then nodded to his band and they started playing.

_"All alone in an empty room_  
_Nothing left but the memories of when I had my best friend_  
_I don't know how we ended up here_  
_I don't know but it's never been so clear_  
_We made a mistake, dear_  
_And I see the broken glass in front of me_  
_I see your shadow hanging over me_  
_And your face, I can see…_

_"Through the trees_  
_I will find you;_  
_I will heal the ruins left inside you_  
_Cuz I'm still here breathing now…"_

I rested my head against Bee's shoulder and listened. They were good, for sure, and they seemed to have passion for their music, which was always better than the canned pop music some artists put out. I looked over towards Mikaela, and she seemed entranced, in a way I hadn't ever seen.

I was considering standing and making my way towards her when something flickered in the corner of my vision. I looked up, only to see a stream of fire running across one of the ceiling beams.

"FIRE!" I screamed, pointing up, and several others looked up just as it caught a string of pennants hanging from it. The pennants lit like tinder, and fell to onto the crowd.

"FIRE!" "RUN!" "AAAHH!"

Everyone started running in different directions, knocking over tables and chairs in the rush to get out. This caused drinks to spill on the floor and on people, and the flames just spread. I looked around for Mikaela, trying to spot where she was, but Bee caught my hand and dragged me through the crowd.

"Come on!"

"Wait, Mikaela-!"

"She was by the stage, it'll be suicide to go that way," Bee pulled me into the hallway towards the bathroom, grabbing a barstool on the way. He shut the lid on the sticker toilet, slid open the window and pushed me up. "Go on, get out, and get away from the window."

I did as he said, sliding through and tumbling to the ground. Thankfully, the gravel wasn't too painful, and then I stepped away, turning back. Ben slammed the barstool into the window three times, breaking out the middle of the window. It made it just tall enough he could push his shoulders through, and I pulled him out the rest of the way. Thank god for leather and jeans, else he would have been cut up.

We backed away from the building, and looked around. Those who escaped were hanging around the back of the parking lot, several on their phones and some hopping in their cars and fleeing the scene. But I couldn't see Mikaela anywhere in the crowd.

"Where is she?" I asked, looking around frantically. "Mikaela! MIKAELA!"

"ALISON!" We heard from the back of the bar, and raced towards it.

As we rounded the building, we saw Mikaela struggling in the grip of two of the band members, pulling her into their van.

"MIKAELA!" I sprinted, but the doors slammed shut and Nikolai threw us a lopsided, almost coy smirk as he ran to the driver's side and hopped in. Like that of a cat who'd finally gotten a mouse he intended to play with before killing.

The van peeled away, and I raced after it. I knew I wasn't going to catch up, but I had to figure out where they were going to go. They turned right out of the parking lot, heading into the woods, and since the fire and police stations - actually most of the town - were in the opposite direction, they had almost no traffic to worry about.

I was just starting to get winded when Bee's Camaro pulled up next to me. I threw myself into the passenger's seat and we took off, catching up to the van. "Where the hell are they going?" I asked

"I don't know," Bee said. "The only things out this way are the McCandless farm, and the Kettle."

Before we could question their motives anymore, the back of the van opened, and one of the band members dumped a box of something out the back. A moment later, the things shattered and Bee slammed the brakes, though not in time to avoid running over it. We heard two loud pops, then the front of the car dipped down and we could only watch as the van got further and further away.

"No!"

"Those bastards!" Bee said, opening his door and looking down. "They dumped beer bottles, they practically spiked our tires."

"We're never going to catch up." A horrible, sinking feeling hit me and my face started to go numb except for the heat of the tears that pricked at my eyes. I clapped my hands over my mouth as I started to sob, and Bee grabbed my shoulders and turned me to face him.

"No, no we aren't letting this stop us. We're going to find her, Alison. We'll rescue her from Low Shoulder and we'll get them arrested. Okay? We're going to get her." He kissed my forehead. "I'm clearing the glass so it doesn't pop the back tires, then we'll get going."

He hopped out and grabbed a fallen branch off the side of the road, with lots of leaves so it acted like a broom and shoved the glass into the grass. Then he started the Camaro again and we drove as fast as we dared on flats. It was going to ruin his front rims, but Mikaela was more important.

I can't remember exactly how long we were on that road, but almost as we were giving up hope of finding them, Bee had to slam the brakes again as a van - the van! - shot out of the dark to our right, before turning and heading back towards town. I looked to the right, and I saw the old wooden sign of a red devil stirring a black pot set back in the woods.

"They were at the Kettle."

Bee didn't need more encouragement to turn down the gravel road, and we crept up, eyes peeled for the slightest sign of Mikaela in the pitch dark. Until it wasn't pitch dark anymore, but a flickering orange light ahead. We followed it, and Bee hit the brakes for a third time when we saw it was a torch, and what was laying underneath.

"MIKAELA!"

We ran to her side, and my heart stopped when I took in the full picture. Mikaela wasn't just laying under the torch, she was tied across a stump, legs together and arms above her head. Her skirt had pooled around her hips, though thankfully her tights were intact and in place, and a blue cloth was tied loosely around her neck. But her dress… the whole front of it was stained red. Blood red.

Bee set to work undoing the binds while I ran my hands over her middle. I would feel the holes in her dress, and looking at her chest, she wasn't breathing. I pressed my ear to her chest. She was cold. No heartbeat.

"No." I looked up at Bee, who had one of Mikaela's wrists in his hand. He shook his head. I started shaking and looked back down at Mikaela.

"No. No. NO!" I cradled Mikaela's face in my hands. "No, no, you're okay. You're just passed out. We'll get you to the hospital, it'll be okay. The doctor's will fix you up, and everything will be okay." I patted her cheeks, as tears started to fall down mine. "Come on, wake up, wake up, Mikaela. Wake up!"

"Alison," Bee put his arm around my shoulders, holding Mikaela's cold hand in his other. He was shaking too, and I knew his silence wasn't stoicism, but him choking on his own sorrow.

"God, why? Why her? Why did they take her?" I rested my head on her chest, holding her and not caring if the blood on her got in me. "Please, God, please, bring her back. Bring her back to us, please!"

_It felt like we wept over her for hours, though in reality, it wasn't that long. Little did I know, it wasn't going to be God answering my prayers..._

I don't know how long we stayed like that, but eventually, Bee squeezed my shoulder and said, "We need to call the cops, tell them what happened."

I nodded and was just about to raise my head when I felt Mikaela's chest move, and heard a rattling sound. I snapped up and, certainly, Mikaela's chest was rising and falling once more.

"M- Mik?" I asked, looking to her face. It was still like before, until her eyes snapped open, and I saw red where blue should have been, a half-second before she lunged.

I was knocked back on my ass as Mikaela leapt at Bee, knocking him flat on his back. She was breathing heavily, rattling like she was choking. Bee stared up at her, and slowly raised a hand to her cheek.

"Mik?"

Suddenly, she shrieked, but it was the most inhuman sound I had ever heard, deep and growly and some part of my hindbrain told me to run, as far and as fast as possible. Bee scrambled back, out from under her, though her nails caught in his shirt and tore it.

"Mikaela, what's wrong?"

Mikaela's whole body jerked, and then she was puking up something nasty and black and oil and spiney. It pooled on the ground and some started to run down towards the cliffside, and I went to Mikaela's side, holding her hair out of the way so it didn't get coated. When it all seemed out, she looked up at me, a broken black and red smile on her lips, and I thought there might be a trace of blue peeking through the blood red in her eyes.

"Mikaela, can you hear me? Are- are you?-"

She didn't answer, she just lunged at me, pinning me down on the stump. Her whole body was pressed on me and her lips grazed my ear and my neck. In a normal situation, this would be very erotic. Now, it was terrifying.

"Are you scared?" she asked, her voice hollow and raspy.

I couldn't even answer her, my throat frozen in terror. Luckily, Bee wasn't and he came over and pulled her off me.

"Mik, what's wrong with you!?" he asked, turning her to face him and grabbing her shoulders. "Snap out of it! The band's not here, you're- AAHH!"

Mikaela's face morphed, her mouth growing inhumanly wide, and she bit down on Bee's right shoulder, through his leather jacket and shirt. Her hands became talons, tearing his jacket up and one swiped across his cheek.

"MIKAELA!" I looked around and saw a branch laying on the ground. I picked it up and swung it at Mikaela's head. It hit, and she fell to the ground, and for a moment she was so still I thought I had killed her again. Then she shifted, and I could see her breathing.

Bee and I looked at each other, and I could read his eyes. Shock, terror, amazement…. It was almost too much to take in, so we focused on the positives. Mikaela was alive, somehow.

"Mom will flip if she sees us like this," I said.

"Uncle Ian and Aunt Chloe will be at Maccadam's, if you can slip into Mikaela's to get some clean clothes…."

I nodded and knelt to pick up Mikaela, taking her top half while Bee got her legs with his good arm. We laid her in the back seat and I sat with her, her head in my lap. I had a hand on her chest or her neck almost the whole time, and not once did I feel a beat or a pulse. But Mikaela kept breathing.


	3. Chapter 2: Trent's Death

_We should have realized something was very wrong. Nobody comes back from the dead, not from so many stab wounds. But love can blind you to the obvious, and Bee and I didn't even realize until the first killing…._

We succeeded in sneaking into Bee's house, after a quick stop to Mikaela's for clean clothes. We showered off the blood and dirt, and stuffed our ruined clothes into a trash bag. I wrapped up Bee's bite mark and scratches so they wouldn't get infected. We washed off Mikaela, and we saw the scars on her body, red and puffy and horrifying, and quickly covered them with Bee's shirt. She didn't wake up once the whole time, and when Bee and I finally fell asleep, it was with her sandwiched between us.

The next morning, Mikaela seemed to remember nothing about the night before, so Bee and I lied our asses off to her and to Ian and Chloe, telling them we fled the scene cause of how in shock Mikaela was, and the tires came from hitting some curbs too fast on our way back. Ian sighed and grumbled something about dealing with Will, but let Bee take his truck to drive us home for backpacks (my mom nearly suffocated me with her hug) and then school.

Our first period was English, and Mr. Simmons informed us of the casualties; eight students, over a dozen parents, Mrs. Line the school nurse, and even Maccadam himself. And Mikaela, except she didn't count because she was sitting right there and looked fine. Well, not fine, but she looked living enough no one noticed, and brushed off any odd behavior as PTSD.

_If only it had been so simple..._

The day was declared an unstructured day, we just had to shuffle from class to class, and were left to do basically whatever. For a lot of people, it was sitting and crying. For me and Bee, it was looking out for Mikaela. She had barely eaten at breakfast, didn't eat at all at lunch, and seemed to be looking worse by the minute.

The day finally ended, and Mikaela and I were leaving our final period, History with Hosney, when someone called my name.

"Alison!"

I turned around to see Miles Lancaster coming up. His sister had been my babysitter when I was younger, and we had shared at least one class every year since middle school. While we weren't best friends, we were good ones, enough so that I knew he'd been dating a Devil's Kettle police officer since junior year.

"Hey, Miles," I said.

"I heard you were at Maccadam's last night. That must have been pretty messed up."

"Yeah, it was," I said, playing with the strap of my backpack. "If not for Bee, I might not have gotten out."

"Not Mikaela?" Miles asked.

I shook my head. "No, she was up by the stage, and got dragged out by the band."

"Wow. They must be even bigger heroes in your eyes then."

I blinked up at him. "What?"

"Low Shoulder. They helped at least a good two dozen people escape the fire, everyone says so."

"Do they?" How did _that_ rumor start? They took Mikaela almost as soon as the blaze started, and were at the back of the bar.

We spoke a few moments more, before Miles moved on, but when I turned back to Mikaela, she wasn't there. I looked around, but couldn't see her anywhere in the crowd. "Mikaela?"

"Alison?" Bee asked, coming up from his math class. "Where's Mikaela?"

"I don't know. I was talking to Miles and she just disappeared on me." I was looking around more desperately, as a sinking feeling entered my gut.

"She can't have gotten far. Come on."

We looked around, weaving through the crowds of students, some crying, some staring off into nothing, some just going through the motions of leaving school to go home. We asked a few of the latter if they had any idea where Mikaela was, but no one had seen her, until we found one each of Bee and Mikaela's teammates.

"Bee, Alison," Sid Renazzo said. "So glad you made it out."

"So are we, dude," Bee said. "Have any of you seen Mikaela?"

"She came by here a little bit ago," Beth Saxon said. "Asked us about Trent, cause she wanted to check on how he's doing after… you know, Craig."

That was a major shock. Trent was Mikaela's ex-boyfriend, who she broke up with in sophomore year, when I came out as gay and he came out as homophobic. She'd barely talked to him except when necessary, so why go out of her way now? Bee and I shared a look, and we both had a bad feeling.

"Where was Trent?" I asked.

"He went out to the field. They're probably still there."

"Thanks guys." Bee and I walked away until we were certain they couldn't see, then took off as fast as we could for the field.

But when we got there, it was deserted, just Mikaela's bag sitting on the bleachers. "Where are they?" Bee asked.

I looked out into the woods. There were trails there that led from the high school to the lake, and little alcoves that couples used for hookups, but the thought of Mikaela doing so with Trent….

My train of thought was interrupted by a loud scream, definitely coming from the woods. But it wasn't a girl's voice, or cries of pleasure. It was a boy's, and it was a sound of pure terror.

We ran into the treeline, down familiar paths and following the screams, until they abruptly ended. That only made us move faster, and we finally found them in one of the hookup spots. But what we saw was not a porno. It was a horror movie.

Trent was dead. His eyes were staring right at us, blank and glassy like blue marbles. His shirt was torn open, but it was an afterthought compared to his throat and gut. And the worst, the very, very worst part of the whole tableau, was Mikaela, half naked, kneeling over the body, and stuffing her face with Trent's guts.

"M-Mikaela?"

She snapped her head up, and somehow, under the blood, I could tell she was as beautiful as she usually was, a far cry from the wreck she was this morning. But that beauty was marred by the blood, by the inhuman maw that took up her face, by the burning red eyes holding us in place as she slurped up an intestine like a noodle.

"Hey babes," she said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. "Care to join me?"

"Mikaela, what have you done?" Bee asked.

"I just did what I needed to survive." She reached down and pulled something out of Trent's gut, I think it was a kidney, and ripped it in half with her teeth. "I mean, you didn't let me feed last night, and my body was so damaged. But I'm all better now, so you don't need to freak."

Bee wasn't as frozen as I was, and he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his Boy Scout pocket knife. "You aren't Mikaela. Mikaela would never do something like this."

Mikaela tilted her head, eating the rest of the kidney. "Not yet. But she will." She swallowed and gave a Glasgow grin, before her face morphed back to normal, and the red in her eyes bled to blue. She blinked at us, then looked down at Trent's corpse and her bloody hands, and screamed.

She scrambled back from the body, no care that she was baring her tits to the world, just moving away. She pushed herself to her feet and looked back at us. She was shaking. "St- Stay away from me! I can't control it. I barely got it to choose Trent. Stay away!"

"Mikaela, wait. Don't go," I said, taking a step forward.

"I have to. I'm sorry." And then she bolted into the woods, far faster than should have been possible.

"Mikaela!" I started to go after her, but Bee stopped me.

"If someone heard her, they'll come investigate. Stay here, hide the evidence, make it seem like you found him. I'll bring her back to my place when I find her."

He was right, we needed to make sure no one knew Mikaela was the killer, especially when it seemed she wasn't. So I nodded and he took off after Mikaela, while I looked around the clearing for signs of Mikaela. I found her hoodie, t-shirt and bra strewn around, and stuffed them in my backpack. I scuffed up the ground and tossed leaves until it looked like no one else had been there. That was all, all else was clear, and I didn't need to fake horror when Mr. Simmons showed up.

* * *

_I must have explained the story a half dozen times; to Mr. Simmons, to Officer Cade Barris, to Deputy Paul Nelson, to the DeMarcos, to my parents. I told the same story every time: I was supposed to meet Bee and Mikaela at the lake, when I heard a sound and investigated. When I got to the clearing, I found Trent, and I screamed. I didn't see anybody, or hear anything before or after. After being told off for wandering the woods alone, and insisting to my mom I was okay, I was allowed to go my way, and I immediately headed over to Bee's house…._

I went right back to Bee's room, and found him cradling Mikaela in his lap. She had tears streaming down her face and had changed into one of Bee's t-shirts and shorts. She turned her head into Bee's chest as he looked up at me.

"No one suspects a thing," I said, dropping my bag and sitting on the bed next to them. "They don't have any evidence of anyone except me and Trent being there. His dad's pissed though; he threatened to turn the killer's balls into a door knocker."

"Good thing Mik doesn't have those," Bee said, but the joke fell extremely flat, and we sat in silence for several minutes.

"I can't believe I did that," Mikaela finally whispered. "Trent is- was an ass, but I didn't want him dead."

"It's not your fault, Mikaela," I said, placing my hand on her back, and my heart dropped when she flinched. "Whatever it was that talked to us- that wasn't you."

"I'd been holding it in all day. It-it kept saying it was hungry, but even the thought of food was making me sick, and I slipped just a moment, and it took me over. It wanted to just grab the first guy and- and munch on him like fucking Cheese-its, and keep going after it was done, but I convinced it to be discrete, and so it lured Trent out to the woods and-" She keened and pressed closer to Bee.

"What the fuck is this thing?" I asked.

"Whatever it is, it's fucking Low Shoulder's fault," Bee said. "I swear, if I ever can get close to them…."

"It's a demon," Mikaela said. "They fucked up a virgin sacrifice and I got a demon in me."

"What!?"

And she explained what had happened, after she took the drinks over to Low Shoulder. How she'd been in a bit of a daze listening to the music, that the fire didn't even register for a minute, by which time Nikolai was leading her out the back door. How he and the other band members were so chill about it, until she thanked them and tried to go find me and Bee. How she'd tried to run, both at Maccadam's and when they got to the Kettle but they caught her easily both times. How she was tied down and gagged, until the assholes realized they'd forgotten her name, so they asked. How Nikolai explained she was the last of a series of sacrifices meant to make them big, so they could live the life of music, chicks, booze, and drugs. How they butchered her while she was aware of the whole thing, until they finally stabbed her in the heart.

Bee tightened his arms around her, as I pressed in on her other side. "They killed you," he said.

Mikaela nodded against his chest. "It was dark, but then I felt this- this cold, so cold it burned, run through me, and next thing I know, I can smell you guys and I just lunged. I-I can see flashes of what I did, then you knocked me out. I woke up the next morning, and there was this voice in the back of my head. It kept telling me to eat, and-and-" She couldn't go on.

"But the thing is gone now, right?" I asked. "You- _It_ ate Trent, so it's gonna go away, right?"

She shook her head. "No, it's still there. It- it's sleeping, or full or something. But it's gonna need to feed again. And- And I don't want to hurt anyone when it does." She started crying again, and Bee and I cried with her.

"You won't, Mikaela," I said. "We won't let you. We're going to fix this, one way or another."

"You know what we've always said," Bee said. "It's Mikaela, Bee, and Alison, from the sandbox to the end. We aren't changing that because of this."

"You're the one who says that, Bee," I said. "But it's true."

"Even though I'm a monster?" Mikaela asked, leaning back slightly to see our faces.

"You are _not_ a monster," I said. "That demon is, and we're getting it out of you. I promise you that."

Mikaela turned so I was the one getting most of her hug, and she cried into my shoulder, and when Bee's and my eyes met over her head, we both silently promised Low Shoulder was going to pay.


	4. Chapter 3: Paxton's Advice

_It was one thing to promise to fix things, but another to actually do it. But I had never had such motivation to succeed in my life. So, like any hard project, I started with research…._

It was a week before any progress could be made. School was ok, but otherwise, our parents and guardians wanted us under their eyes, and if my mom or Bee's aunt and uncle caught a whiff of us looking into occult stuff, they'd have us in front of a counselor and a priest in a minute (Mikaela's aunt was a bit more open, but her definition of allowed occult was crystals and tarot cards). And I couldn't try research at school either, cause our theology teacher, Mr. Atlas, was also the librarian, and even if an occult section could survive his reign, he always gave me devil eyes just for being a lesbian.

In that time, we noticed not only changes in Mikaela, but in Bee. Mikaela had to watch her movements, as the demon had shown her she was not only much stronger than normal, but faster, and it would only be too easy for someone to notice. But then Bee popped a football he caught at practice, and actually completed a dash from center field to the endzone in a second, and we knew something was up.

And things were up on Low Shoulder's end too. The whole town was singing their praises cause of that rumor that they pulled people out of the fire, and they got a record deal and their single "Through The Trees" was playing on literally every radio station at least ten times a day. The third time it came on in one afternoon, Bee actually punched his stereo, which sent it flying into the wall and smashed it.

Finally, the second Saturday after the fire, we talked our way into being allowed out again, and while Bee took Mikaela to the park nearby to try and practice with these new powers, I went to the library and started looking for anything to help. I didn't want to try and ask someone for help, just in case word got back, so I went to one of the computers and typed in "occult" to the library catalogue.

I was relieved to find several results pop up, and after making note of what the titles were, I closed out and headed to that section.

And all but one of the titles were a bust. One was a memoir of a priest, but his experience with exorcisms were with locations, not people. Another was a demonology guide, but it was written from a historical standpoint, and had nothing written on exorcisms but that they involved herbs, prayers, and holy water. Three weren't even non-fiction, but just a novel series about a nun who fought demons. And one was very clearly a born-again Christian's take on the occult and I slammed it shut the first time it said being gay was a sign of demons.

But the last one was a small jackpot. It was an actual, proper, demonology book, with in depth explanations and chapters, and it was almost just what I needed. A search in the index revealed a passage called "demonic transference", and reading it, I found what exactly had happened to Mikaela.

"'If the human sacrifice is impure, the result may still be obtained, but a demon will forever reside in the soul of the victim. She must forever feed on flesh to sustain herself. In the various-' What else does it say?" I skimmed through the rest of the passage, and it mentioned how there was evidence of transferring the demon to animals, but the book left no details on how to do that, and the only other way it said to kill a demon was to stab it through the heart while it was weak from not feeding. That was the exact opposite of what I wanted, so I was back to square one.

I dropped the books on the return cart and went back to the computer, in the hopes that there was something I had missed. I expanded my search from just books to anything, and something caught my eye.

"'Mass Murder at Steele Farm; Rumors of Occult Activity in the Kettle'?" I clicked on it, and it said it was an article from the Cook County News-Herald, the only newspaper in our area, from about twenty years ago. The catalogue said it was on a microfiche, so I went to the microfiche room and dug around until I found it. I fed it to the machine, and read through.

_"Mass Murder at Steele Farm; Rumors of Occult Activity in the Kettle_

_"Late last night, the Cook County Sheriff's Office was called due to a supposed disturbance at the Steele family farm just outside of Devil's Kettle. When the officers arrived, they found a massacre in the barn, with several prominent citizens of Devil's Kettle and the surrounding towns eviscerated, including 44-year-old Alexander and Rebecca Steele, and 53-year-old Deputy Sheriff Leland Stark._

_"The only survivor, whose name is being withheld at this time for their safety, was rushed to the hospital for their injuries and is in stable condition. According to a statement released by the CCSO, this individual has testified that all involved were holding a gathering when an unknown man arrived, incapacitated everyone, and started killing the other attendees. The survivor claims they are uncertain why they were spared, having passed out during the attack._

_"While the exact nature of the gathering has not been confirmed by the CCSO, evidence found at the scene suggests that some kind of occult activity was going on. All the victims were found wearing long black cloaks, and items found at the scene include a black cauldron containing the remains of a questionable substance, black candles, and a journal that appeared to contain satanic rituals. It is being suggested that the Steeles and Deputy Stark, as well as the other victims were performing one of these rituals when the killer attacked._

_"The amount of evidence regarding the killer is limited, according to reports, with a trail leading from the barn to the woods and then disappearing. So far, there are no official suspects, though Cook County citizens are advised to watch out for a large man with long blonde hair and a burn scar on his left cheek."_

"Interesting reading, Alison?"

I just about jumped out of my skin as I turned and found myself face to face with Orion Paxton, the assistant librarian. We'd met a few times before; his wife Elle and Bee's Aunt Chloe were sisters, so he was at most family functions Bee invited Mikaela and I to, and he also occasionally watched the high school's library when Mr. Atlas had business out of town.

"Hi, Mr. Paxton," I said casually. "Just... looking through some old papers for a school project."

"I see." He looked at the screen of the microfiche reader. "An interesting article you're reading there."

"I know right. I mean, Devil's Kettle sounds like the kind of town occult stuff would happen in, but I never imagined anyone would actually try it." I casually looked back at the reader for a moment. "I'll have to ask my mom what she remembers of back then, I've never heard this story before."

"It's not a pleasant one," Mr. Paxton said. He looked around and I copied him. Nothing. No one there but us. This is what he was hoping for, cause he took a step closer to me, practically boxing me in. "Alison, I saw your reading material. Whatever you are planning, I am warning you now to back away. The occult is not something you want to be messing with."

I was a moment away from another denial, but his eyes…. They were sad, like the consequences he was alluding to had affected him personally. He was in his late forties if I remembered right, he would have been around for that massacre. Someone he knew might have been in it.

I sighed and looked down. "I don't want to mess with it, but… something happened, and I need a cure. If I can't find one then… there's going to be more death."

I looked up, and felt tears start to well in my eyes. I don't know if that convinced him, or if he believed my words, but after a moment of held gazes, he reached into his vest pocket and pulled out a notepad and pen and started writing.

"Go to this address in Angel Falls. Tell them that Orion sent you, and ask that they listen to your story." He tore the page out and handed it to me. "I am _not_ promising they will be able to help, but if anyone can, it would be them."

For the first time in a week, a real smile lit up my face. "Thank you, Mr. Paxton!" I ran out the room, out the library, and into the park, calling for Bee and Mikaela.

"Did you find anything?" Bee asked once he and Mikaela were at my side.

"The books were a bust. But, I learned something interesting," I said. "Twenty years ago, there was a massacre at this farm just outside town, and it's believed that a bunch of satanists were performing a ritual when they were all murdered."

"How'd you hear that?" Mikaela asked.

"There was a news article about it, It's in the microfiche library. But that's not all." I held up the paper. "Mr. Paxton saw what I was looking at, and I think he figured something was up, so he tried to warn me away from it. I didn't tell the truth, but I told him enough that he gave me this address, and he says the people who live there might be able to help us. "

"Really?" Bee snatched the paper from me and read it. "Angel Falls. I know where that is, we play against them the third week of September every year."

"Why are we standing here like goobers, then, let's go!" Mikaela said, and almost ran to Bee's car. Almost, cause I knew by now if she wanted to, she could be much faster than the speed walk she was doing.

I turned to Bee as we followed after her. "How is she doing?"

"Terrified, though she doesn't want to show it." Bee shook his head. "She's worried the demon is going to pop up and make her eat someone at random, and nothing I say can snap her out of it."

I sighed. "Let's hope these people will be able to help us."

* * *

_Angel Falls, like Devil's Kettle, is named after a waterfall. The reason this place got the nice name is because supposedly, when the settlers got out here, the first settler to take a drink from just under the falls thought the spray of the water looked like angel wings with the sunlight shining through it. I'm sure if we went by there today, the falls would look just like any other waterfall, especially on the ugly grey day we were having. But we weren't heading to the falls. It turns out, we were looking for a witch…._

Bee drove us down, but once in Angel Falls itself, we couldn't quite find the address we were looking for. So, like any smart person, we asked for directions.

"Excuse me," I asked a man walking his dog. "My friends and I are looking for 366 Devil Track Road. Do you know where that is?"

The man's dog started barking at the car. "Quiet, Scor!" he snapped, then narrowed his eyes at me. "Why do you want to know?"

"That's not important," I said. "Can you just tell me where it is?"

He held that look. "If you kids are planning to prank the witch, I wouldn't. She doesn't take uninvited guests well, especially those who try to pull shit."

"What we're doing has nothing to do with you," Mikaela said, sticking her head out the window beside me. "Just tell us how to get there, will you?" I could just see her lips were pulled back just the slightest bit too far, and I placed my hand on hers to try and calm her down.

The dog cowered and the man's eyes widened. He pointed down the road. "Take a right here, then the second left, and follow the road until you come to a gravel drive marked by a stone cairn painted red and grey. The house is a mile or so down the track. But don't say I didn't warn you." And he pulled his dog away, walking the opposite way as he'd pointed.

I turned around as Mikaela sat down in the back again. "What was that?"

"I-I don't know," she said. "Something- There's something here that's… agitating for some reason. I can't figure out what, but the demon… it's stirring, and it's not happy."

"Hopefully this 'witch' has an answer," Bee said, and he started driving again.

The directions were thankfully easy to follow, but as we left town, it was clear that this "witch" didn't want to be around people. We almost drove past the cairn, and as we went down the drive, we could see "No Trespassing" signs and objects hanging from the trees that looked almost like they were trying to ward people away, or at least creep them out. And in the back, Mikaela had her arms wrapped around her and her eyes closed. I think she was muttering something, but I couldn't hear what she was saying.

Finally, the trees thinned out and we could see a two story house sitting on an open acre. It was an older style, one I couldn't name offhand, and painted a light cream or yellow color. A porch covered half the front, with more objects like in the woods hanging from the roof, and the other half had vines on trellises climbing up. A large garden bed sat between the house and a separate garage and car park, under which was a dark red Dodge Charger and a black and silver motorcycle. Maybe in spring or summer, it'd be pretty, but today it just felt cold and foreboding, the only signs of life the sound of a dog barking and smoke trailing out the chimney.

"M-Maybe that man was right," Mikaela said. "Maybe this was a mistake. There's something here. Something not good. We should go."

"You were the one eager to come out here before," I said.

"And now I want to leave!" She closed her eyes again. "The- the demon doesn't like this. Something's wrong out here."

"It's the only lead we have," Bee argued. "If we give up now, we might not ever figure out how to help you."

"I don't need help!" she suddenly snapped, her eyes opening, and there was red. "Just some flesh every week or so, and all will be fine."

Bee and I jerked back, then Bee reached back and grabbed her wrist. "Let Mikaela out, you monster."

"Get away from here, and I might," the demon snarled, cheeks splitting into the monstrous maw it had shown before. It tried to jerk its arm away, but Bee held firm.

He turned to me. "Go to the door, Alison, tell the witch why we're here. She must know something, else this thing wouldn't be trying to get away."

I nodded and jumped out, speedwalking to the door. I thought I saw a hand in the curtain of a window as I stepped on the porch, but when I looked it had disappeared. I took a deep breath and knocked firmly on the door.

It opened, the dog's barking got louder, and a woman looked out at me. She wasn't what I was expecting for a "witch", though to be fair, I'm not exactly certain what I was expecting. She seemed to be Asian-American, and in her mid-thirties. She was wearing a burgundy turtleneck under a black drapey vest and a long grey skirt. Her long black hair was tucked behind her ears, and her green eyes were piercing.

"May I help you?" she asked, a hint of suspicion in her voice.

"My name is Alison Witiwicky," I said. "Orion Paxton sent me here. He said you might be able to help me with a… problem, and asks that you listen to my story."

The woman lifted a brow slightly, her eyes flicking to the Camaro, before returning her gaze to me. I feared she might just shut the door in my face. But instead, she stepped onto the porch, crossing her arms.

"All right. I'll listen."

I took a deep breath. "Just over a week ago, my girlfriend was kidnapped and sacrificed. But they screwed it up and now she's… she's possessed. She's still in there, but the demon keeps trying to take control and it has a few times now. We're trying to find a cure before anyone else gets hurt."

The woman stared at me, her expression unreadable, then her eyes softened and a bit of tension seemed to leave her shoulders. Her change of demeanor actually made me feel at ease. "I see." She looked back at the car. "That explains it."

"Explains what?" I looked back as well, and I could see Bee still struggling with the demon in Mikaela's body. "Oh. Yeah. I don't know why, but it started freaking out when we came down this way."

"I'm not surprised. I'm more surprised your other friend is able to hold her." She looked back at me. "He was bitten, wasn't he?"

I blinked. "Yeah, how did you know?"

"I'm familiar with the effects of demon bites. Those few who manage to survive such a wound take on some of the demon's strength."

"That would explain it. He popped a football at practice this week." I clasped my hands together. "Can you help us? We have no other leads, and the only way I've found to exorcise a demon is to kill the host."

The woman opened her mouth to reply when I heard breaking glass from the car. I spun around to see that Bee must have lost hold of Mikaela, who managed to break a window and was practically crawling out the gap to get away.

"No!" I moved to run towards her, but the woman caught my arm.

"Wait a moment. She won't get far."

"What are you-"

Mikaela escaped the Camaro, landing like a cat, and sprang up to bolt when a man was suddenly in her path and she plastered herself to the car door. Even from here, I could see her eyes were wide and she was shaking with… fear?

The man just stood there, arms crossed. He couldn't have been more than twenty-nine, but his black hair was streaked with silver. His face was harshly handsome, and he was wearing a black jacket over a grey shirt, dark jeans, and boots.

He looked Mikaela up and down, and finally spoke. "So you are the one Cade told us about. _Libidine_ , aren't you?"

Mikaela didn't answer at first, sliding along the side of the car until she reached Bee, who had jumped out while I was focused on the man, and was wrapped in his arms. " _I-Ira_ ," the demon spoke. "You are _Ira_."

The man nodded. "I am." He took a step forward and unfolded his arms. "And your host wants to speak to us, so kindly retreat. You are well fed and have no need to surface."

He raised an open hand in front of Mikaela's forehead and she jerked back in Bee's hold, then her trembles stopped and she blinked several times. I ran to her side, and her eyes were her true blue color once more.

"What did you do?" I asked, and turned to the man. Up close, I could see his eyes were hard and blue-grey, and his features reminded me of someone.

"I simply convinced the demon of lust in her to retreat for the time being." He fixed a look on me and Bee. "You risked a lot bringing her here. Demons do not care for intruders in their territory."

"Orion Paxton sent us," Bee defended.

"It was still foolish of him to not warn you of the danger." He shook his head with a frustrated sigh.

It was then I realized, for all that we were putting our hopes in the hands of these people, we knew nothing about them, except that they might be able to help. I looked from the man to the woman, who had come closer, but not entirely joining us. "Who are you?"

"I am Michael Troy," the man said. "And this is my wife, Asami. We have an intimate knowledge of demons and the occult. For you to come here blindly, you must be desperate."

"We are," Mikaela said. "You have to help us, please, before this thing kills again."

Michael looked at us with his steely gaze, and nodded. "Very well. Come inside." He walked towards the house, Asami walking with him, and Mikaela, Bee, and I following behind.


	5. Chapter 4: Troys' Story

_In hindsight, it should have been obvious that when dealing with an occult disaster, we'd be sent to get help from someone who survived one themselves. But that still left a dozen and a half questions that needed to be answered. Luckily, Asami and Michael seemed willing to do so…._

The inside of the house was quite nice and inviting, which for some reason was surprising. Floral wall paper and light brown beadboard lined the entrance hall and the living room, the furniture a similar shade. Shelves lined one wall, as well as one by the fireplace which was roaringly warm, and were filled with books, small plants, and a few decorative pieces, mainly wolves. A few pictures lined the walls and sat on the mantle, and standing on the rug in front of the fire was a black German Shepherd, who had their lips pulled back in a snarl and a low growl in their throat.

"Easy, Nemesis," Michael said, sitting in an armchair that was partly turned towards the fire. " _Libidine_ will not attack, and if she attempts to rise up again, I will handle her."

Nemesis - an odd name for a dog but I'd heard weirder - looked at their master and uncurled their lips, though the growl didn't completely disappear until Michael petted their head.

"Sit, please," he said. "Don't mind Nemesis. She is my familiar, and a bit overprotective. Asami taught her a bit too well."

"Or just well enough," Asami said, picking up a tea tray that had been on a table between his armchair and another. "I'll make a fresh pot, and I believe we have some cookies left for a snack." She went back to the hall, presumably to head to the kitchen.

Mikaela, Bee, and I sat on a sofa that faced the armchairs, and things quickly became awkward, as none of us had any idea of what to say, and Michael seemed content with just watching us while petting Nemesis's head. I decided to take a closer look at the pictures. Most had either Asami or Michael, sometimes both, and almost all of them had a boy and a girl in them, growing from childhood to teenagers. One was sitting on an end table close to me, and I was able to take a good look at them. They both had light brown skin, that shade that made you question if they were mixed race or just really really tan, and curly hair. The boy's was brown, with eyes a few shades darker, while the girl's was honey blonde, with grey-blue eyes. They looked to be about nine and seven respectively in the picture, and were sitting between Asami and Michael on a bench in an amusement park. They all had ice cream cones and were all grinning at the camera.

"Our children, Peter and Molly," Michael's voice made me snap my head to look up at him. But he had a small smile on his face, so I didn't think he was upset. "They're in college now, so they won't be showing up unexpectedly."

College? I took another look at the picture, then him. He had a bit more silver in his hair, but…. "You don't look a day older than that picture."

He nodded. "A blessing or a curse, depending on how you look at it. I have to put on makeup whenever I go to see any of their school events." He frowned deeply, obviously not liking that fact. What part of it, I wasn't sure.

"So the- the demon…" Mikaela started, but that was when Asami came in with the tray. Sure enough, there was tea and cookies, but also two small tupperware containers with forks.

She set the tray on the table, poured tea, and carried two cups back to the armchairs, where she took the free one as Bee, Mikaela, and I mixed to our taste. "So, you came here to try and free Mikaela from her demon."

Bee nodded. "It's what we want more than anything."

"How about you give us the full story on how you came to be here," Michael said. "Then we will have a better idea of how to help you."

And so the story spilled out; Low Shoulder, the fire, the chase to the Kettle, Mikaela waking up and biting Bee, her weakness and illness the next day until she ate Trent, and how we'd been trying to look for a cure with little luck until today. As it went on, Asami and Michael would exchange looks, like they were talking without speaking, and their expressions grew the slightest bit more grim.

When the story finished, Michael shook his head with a sigh. "We had a feeling something was happening when we heard of the fire, then Cade told us of the murder. I'm certain he would have directed you to us if Orion hadn't."

"Cade Barris? The cop?" Bee asked.

"He's an old friend," Asami said. "And one of the few who knows about us." She gestured between herself and Michael. "We try to keep our ears out for any other attempted occult activity in the area to try and stop it. One demon in the area has been more than enough."

"But now there's two," Mikaela said, her grip on her tea cup tightening and she quickly set it down, looking at Michael. "You called me something earlier. ' _Libidine_ '? And my demon called you ' _Ira_ '?"

Michael nodded. "For some reason, it seems demons like Latin titles. _Libidine_ is Latin for lust, which is what your demon is. You lure your prey in with sexual promises, then kill them."

"That explains Trent," Bee said. "He always wanted you back, even after we all made it clear to his face it wasn't gonna happen. What about ' _Ira_ '?"

Michael frowned. "Wrath. My demon even before it was literal." Asami laid a hand on his arm and he covered it with his own. "My prey needs to be angry, then scared when they see I am much worse than they are."

"Do all demons eat human flesh?" I asked.

"Not all, but a number of them," Asami said. "Luckily, we've had twenty years to figure out how to work with and around it."

"Twenty years…. Wait." I leaned forward a bit. "The whole reason Mr. Paxton knew to send us to you was because he saw me looking up an article from twenty years ago."

"The Steele Farm Massacre," Michael stated, and I felt the hair on the back of my neck rise with the underlying growl backing his words. Judging from how Bee and Mikaela both shifted, they were unsettled too. Nemesis, who had been resting at his feet, raised her head and pushed against his hand until Michael scratched her ears. "The world is better off with them gone."

I had the realization of why we were sent here. "It was you. You killed them all."

"Not all of them," Asami said, lifting a finger to her turtleneck's collar. Tugging it down, we could see two rows of jagged scars on either side of her throat. Teeth marks.

"That's…."

"Reminders of the most terrible night of both our lives." Asami adjusted her collar again, covering up the scars before looking at me with a wane smile. "I told you that I was familiar with the effects of demon bites."

"But, the paper said it was a random attacker," I said.

"Because I lied. I've been told I'm quite good at it," she said, a strange bitterness to her voice. "Have to be when you grow up the daughter of a cult leader."

"Which we've never heard of," Bee said, shaking his head. "It doesn't make sense. People still talk about how Reed Windston eloped with Charles Donaven and that was almost a decade ago. Why does nobody talk about the suspected cult?"

"Because it was covered up. Mostly. Obviously Orion was remiss in forgetting to remove that bit of information from the archives," Michael stated.

"By who?"

"Mayor Peter Paxton, for one," Asami said. "Among a few others like Sheriff Terent Barris, and Betty Tennyson."

"But why?" Mikaela asked.

"For starters, reputation," Michael said, with a scoff. "After all, what town wants to be known for the massacre of a cult led by the Deputy Sheriff?"

"And for Michael's protection," Asami said. "And a lesser extent, mine. Before-" she held up a hand to stop any new questions "-you ask anymore, perhaps we should just tell you our story. It's not pretty, but it will be easier than explaining it piecemeal."

And so they told us.

Asami began first, explaining how she had grown up witnessing her father and the cult's rituals and animal sacrifices. How she never truly believed in the occult and just wanted a normal life. How she found a chance at it when she met Michael and the two fell in love with plans to elope. How her father had eventually discovered their affair and the cult kidnapped Michael for a sacrifice. How Asami was forced to watch the cult carve him up and leave him to an agonizingly slow death. How she made the devastating choice to slit Michael's throat to end his suffering quickly.

Then Michael spoke of when _Ira_ took over, how it latched onto his anger and hatred. How it possessed him and turned him into a beast that eviscerated the cult members. How when the demon attacked Asami, he wrestled back control enough to only maim but not kill. How he fled and hid in the forest, waiting days before seeking out Asami again. How the two reunited and promised to face the future together, no matter what it brought. And how when their closest friends and family learned what happened, they agreed to help them.

Even though their voices were calm and collected, I didn't miss how they clung to each other's hand tightly the entire time they spoke, as if to remind themselves the other was there beside them.

"God, that-" I didn't have words.

"I told you it wasn't a pleasant tale," Asami said. "But it's one we've come to terms with over the years and accepted it as our reality, like you will with yours."

"So… there's no cure, is there?" Mikaela asked. "If there was, you would have done it years ago, wouldn't you?" I felt her starting to shake a little and hugged her.

Asami leaned forward and placed a hand on Mikaela's knee comfortingly. "There is a way to free a possessed soul," she said gently.

"One I refuse to even consider," Michael interjected sharply, then his voice softened. "But for you, there still could be a chance."

"What is it?" Bee asked.

"The possessed soul has to find the person who gave the killing blow and inflict the same injuries they suffered with the same weapon used to kill them, before cutting out their heart and eating it. That will satisfy the demon and send it back to where it came from."

Ah. I can see why he would refuse that.

"So we need to murder Low Shoulder," I said. "I'm game for that."

"Maybe the knife is still out by the Kettle," Bee said. "We can swing by on the way home and find it."

"But what if we can't?" Mikaela asked, her voice trembling. "What if it's gone and I can never get rid of this demon?"

"Then we'll teach you how to live with it," Michael said, folding his hands together. "As we said, we've had twenty years of trial, error, and study to learn how to handle my demon. We will share that knowledge with you, and while it might not be the life you wanted, you can still have a good one."

Mikaela, Bee and I shared nervous looks, Mikaela especially. "I- I don't want to hurt anyone," she said.

"That doesn't seem like an option, Mik," I said. "But this way, we can make sure it's the right people getting hurt."

"And whatever happens, you, me, and Alison will be in it together," Bee said. "From the sandbox to the end."

We both took her hands and squeezed them, and Mikaela squeezed back as she looked between us. She nodded. "Okay." She looked back to Michael and Asami. "Thank you."

Michael smiled, a hint of sharpness to it. Not threatening, just reminding. "Then we'll get started."


	6. Chapter 5: Pack's Hunt

_And just like that, Mikaela, Bee, and I entered the world of the occult. And Michael meant it about starting the training right away. The first lesson revealed what was in the tupperware; raw organ meats. Apparently that helped settle the demon and keep it sated until the next hunt. One he promised to lead us on the following week..._

We must have spent hours with Michael and Asami, the two giving us some basic tips to help keep Mikaela's demon tame, with the promise of more in depth lessons later. The meat was eaten, as well as an actual meal, and before we finally left, Asami placed a little satchel around Mikaela's neck and instructed her to keep it on except for showers. Mikaela swore to take baths for the foreseeable future. We exchanged phone numbers, and Michael practically ordered us to call them if anything happened.

Sunday, though we told Mikaela she didn't need to come back there, we all went back to the Kettle to look for the knife. But no matter how we searched, there was no sign of it anywhere. Bee suggested that Low Shoulder might have taken it with them, but Mikaela firmly believed they threw it into the water, where it was lost forever to wherever the Kettle opened to. She broke down crying and we held her close until it passed.

After that, we didn't have much time to focus on the occult, with school picking up again after the tragedies. Homework, practice, and parents kept us close to home, but we were anxiously waiting until the weekend, for whatever hunt Michael had in mind. The only hint we had to it was a text from Asami asking our dress and shoe sizes.

Early Saturday, we headed back to Angel Falls, and pulled up to the farmhouse. Asami and Michael were already awake and outside, working in the garden on something. Nemesis was laying on the porch, but raised her head and barked as we pulled up.

Asami and Michael waved and met us as we climbed out of Bee's car. "You're here early. That's good, we have much to teach you."

"That's why we came," Bee said. "Where do we start?"

"Have you eaten?" Asami asked, and our shifty looks gave us away. "Figured. Come in, we've got plenty to feed you."

After a hearty breakfast cooked by Michael, which was mainly meat and eggs, he stood and said, "Mikaela, Ben, you are with me."

"What are we doing?" Mikaela asked.

"Since Ben was bitten, he is the one with the best chance of controlling you if _Libidine_ takes over. I'll be teaching you how to handle that situation."

"What about me?" I asked.

"You'll be with me," Asami said, gathering the dishes from the table. "I'll be teaching you the other ways to help keep _Libidine_ under control beyond brute strength or a full stomach."

"Really? Like, witchcraft?" That perked my interest. I'd never been truly religious in my life, and after my coming out, well, I'd been called a demon-consorting witch by a few of the worst homophobes, why not make that true.

"Yes, some would call it that." She put the dishes down in the sink and picked up a paring knife with a white handle. "Mikaela, come here a second."

Mikaela did, and held out her hand when instructed. Asami grabbed it with one hand, and with the other, cut her middle finger.

"HEY!" Mikaela tried to jerk away, but Asami's grip was too strong, as she held Mikaela's finger over a glass vial I hadn't realized was sitting on the counter. Once the vial was full, Asami let go and Mikaela put her finger to her mouth. "That hurt."

Asami lifted the knife slightly. "Silver. It slows the healing enough to let me get that sample. You'll be fine in a minute." She washed the knife, then corked the vial and washed her hands.

"What is that for, some kind of phylactery or something?" Bee asked.

"Not exactly," Michael said. "Come on, we have much to work on." He stopped by Asami long enough for her to kiss his cheek, then disappeared outside with Mikaela and Bee.

Asami dried her hands and nodded towards the doorway. "Let's move to the living room."

I sat down on the sofa while she pulled a couple books off the shelves. "This is not traditional witchcraft," she said outright. "It's something Michael and I have developed, which takes parts from a few different occult studies." She sat down and opened the top book, which I could now see was a journal. "We're starting with a variant on a witch's bottle."

"Witch's bottle?"

"In medieval times, it was believed to be able to capture curses a witch might throw at you." She set the journal down and pointed to a sketch, which showed a glass vial with some plants, berries and a braid of hair inside it. "This bottle will make it so _Libidine_ won't immediately attack you if it happens to take control of Mikaela again."

"It didn't do that the last couple times," I said.

"Because Bee was there. _Libidine_ will always go for him first, because it knows he will be its biggest obstacle. But if he isn't, say he's at football practice or you and Mikaela are having girls' day, then _Libidine_ will come after you and you don't have the physical strength to fight it." She tapped the book. "So, witch's bottle."

That, unfortunately, made a lot of sense. "Okay, how do we start?"

Turns out, the ingredients of this witch's bottle were a small braid of my hair (cut from behind my ear) soaked in a mix of Mikaela's blood and a few drops of my own, lavender, pennyroyal, dill seeds, and juniper berries. She washed my hands with some soda water before having me go through the herbs and picking which ones to use. Something about the more my psychic energy was in the bottle, the better the spellwork.

Once the braid had soaked for eleven minutes and eleven seconds (Asami said that numerology played a part in that timing but we'd worry about it later), we pulled it out of the blood and set it dry on a silver tray. She had me weave the sprigs of lavender and pennyroyal into the braid, then drop the dill seeds and juniper berries into a flask that was about the length of my middle finger. The braid went in next, as well as a couple drops of rosemary oil. A cork, some cord, and a bit of wax, and the bottle was sealed and securely tied.

"Here," Asami tied it around my neck. "I understand you won't be able to keep it on all the time, but try to keep it as close as you can. Hopefully the hunts will keep _Libidine_ satisfied, but just in case."

I looked down at where it rested over my heart, lifting it slightly. The image of Mikaela, jaw split impossibly wide and those blood red eyes, was certainly enough motivation to keep it close. "I will. Promise."

Asami smiled. "Good. I'll copy down the directions and you can walk Bumblebee through making one for himself later. For now," she sat next to me and opened one of the other books. "We'll start with the basics."

And basics we did, with herbcraft. She showed me why we used the herbs we did in the bottle (lavender for calming, pennyroyal and dill for protection, and juniper for both protection and mental clarity), then expanded on other uses for the herbs.

A few hours later, Michael, Mikaela and Bee came back, my girlfriend and boyfriend looking a bit tired and dirty, and we had lunch, then Asami took Mikaela and I to one of the house's spare bedrooms. There, she opened the closet and revealed a bunch of dresses, blouses, skirts, and pants, with heels lined up on the floor.

"Mikaela can pick from the left and Alison, you get the right side," she said. "Once Mikaela showers, you can pick some jewelry from my collection and I'll help you two get ready."

"Wait, is this what you wanted our dress sizes for?" Mikaela asked, stepping up to look at the dresses on her side.

"Of course. It helps throw off the trail if you wear something outside your usual wardrobe. And where we're going, there's a dress code."

"We're going clubbing?" I asked.

Asami smiled. "Indeed we are, girls. Even got you some fake IDs, though we will also be testing Mikaela's persuasive powers."

"What, you mean like hypnotism or something?" Mikaela asked.

"It's possible, we'll know for certain tonight. Now get cleaned up." She waved Mikaela towards the ensuite.

About two hours later, we were dolled up and ready. I was in a green long sleeved mini dress, cut high enough I could tuck my witch's bottle into my cleavage, with a pair of brown sandal heels, wooden bracelets, and some matching eyeshadow, with my hair pulled back in a half ponytail. Mikaela picked a black strapless dress with black peep toe heels, a big necklace of turquoise stones, gold bangles, and smokey eyeshadow, with her hair stylishly messy. Asami had a burgundy and black long sleeved bodycon dress, with black boots, gold jewelry, and burgundy eyeshadow, her hair hanging loose except for one side being clipped back from her face. Bee's jaw dropped when we came out, and Michael smiled at Asami.

"Can I go with you three?" Bee asked, only half-jokingly, and Michael smacked him on the back of the head.

"Sorry, Bee, it's girls' night," Mikaela said, but her smile and laugh was a little off.

"They'll be in Minneapolis. You and I will be heading for Hibbing," Michael said.

"Tracking that pedophile?" Asami asked, and Michael nodded.

"Wait, we're driving four hours for this hunt?" I asked.

"It's best to keep the deaths as spread out as possible," Asami said. "Even if the victims are the scum of society, the law still tries to solve the murders and disappearances."

Fair point, and so we said goodbye to Michael and Bee and got in Asami's Charger (the motorcycle was Michael's, but tonight he and Bee would be taking the Camaro) and headed down towards Minneanapolis.

About halfway there, in the middle of a conversation about movies we'd seen, Mikaela jerked, looking from side to side before sinking back in her seat and covering her ears. "Shut up, shut up, shut up."

"Mikaela?" I asked, reaching from the back to touch her shoulder, but she flinched from me.

"Don't!" She glanced back at me. "The demon - _Libidine_ \- it's pushing forward again. Talking to me about how good the hunt will be. It's gross."

"It can sense it will be fed, and wants control again," Asami said. "You can contain it, though. We're going after a target tonight, not a random civilian. Keep reminding it of that, and you will be fine."

"Do you and Michael have like, a list of creeps or something?" I asked.

"Something like that," Asami said. "I'll point him out once we're there."

It was around seven when we got to the club, and it was already quite busy. We got in line, and as we made our way to the front, Asami laid out part of the plan.

"The doorman is called Roller," Asami explained. "He knows me, so your job is to convince him he doesn't need to see our ID cause he can trust me to not bring in anyone underage."

"Right, no pressure," Mikaela said, but a moment later we were at the front, in front of a big redhead bouncer.

"Asami! It's been a while," Roller said with a big grin.

"Hi, Roller," Asami smiled back. "Has work been treating you alright?"

"Same old, same old. Haven't gotten a black eye in two months now." He looked over Mikaela and me. "And who are these lovely ladies?"

"New coven members. Celebrating with their first witches' night out."

"Really now?" He smiled at us. "Well, I'll have to see some ID then."

"Do you really?" Mikaela asked, and her whole demeanor changed as she spoke. It was similar to when she was using her puppy eyes to make Bee and I do something, but with an edge to it that I just noticed. She fluttered her lashes and squeezed her chest just slightly. "You know that Asami wouldn't bring in anyone underage, don't you?"

"Hmm, you might have a point…." Roller's eyes looked a little glazed, even as he blinked hard to try and clear it. "I really should…."

"Let us in already, before we hold the line up too much." And a new undertone to her voice, sultry and promising. Promising what, I wasn't sure.

"You're right, you're right." He unhooked the rope and pulled it aside. "In you go, ladies. Enjoy your witches' night."

"Thanks, Roller," Asami said, gently patting his arm as she passed him.

Mikaela and I followed her into the club, and once past the dress code receptionist, I breathed a deep sigh of relief, while Mikaela shook herself for a moment.

"That was…."

"Well, we know you have hypnosis," Asami said. "That'll make things a bit easier. And don't worry, Roller will be fine."

"You sure?" I asked, looking back, but nothing seemed amiss.

"The effects of the hypnosis don't last very long," Asami assured me. "Especially with yours only being pressing a minor suggestion."

The club had two levels it looked like, a main dancefloor and bar, and what looked like a VIP section on a balcony above the bar. We found a booth easily, since the place wasn't packed yet, and ordered something to drink (virgin, since we wanted clear heads for a while at least).

Asami clearly was a regular here as our server recognized her and pleasantly chatted with us for a few minutes, mentioning about how her new relationship was going well after her ex had finally gotten the message and stopped harassing her. The slight gleam I caught in Asami's eye made me wonder if the ex had crossed paths with Michael. After the server left, Asami encouraged Mikaela and I to go and dance for a bit, that she'd tell us when she spotted our target, which was about an hour after we arrived.

We just got back to the table for a break, and Asami pointed to a booth across the way. Inside, a big blond man with a wide smile sat with a couple other guys. Aesthetically, he was pretty handsome, but the way his eyes scanned the room was very off putting.

"There. Zachary Sexton. He is a respectable city official, up for re-election next year I believe." Her eyes narrowed and her voice lowered. "And he uses that position to silence any of the girls he abuses."

"That's horrible," I said, looking back at him. For a split second, I thought we met eyes, but I turned around before I could confirm. I felt I didn't want to confirm it.

"So what's our plan?" Mikaela asked. "I presume it's not walking up, saying 'wanna fuck?' and dragging him into the alley out back."

"No, you need to draw his attention first from a distance, then play coy, keep him interested, and eventually he'll approach you. After that, just listen to what he has to say, act impressed."

"So a lot of what I did dating Trent," Mikaela said. "That will be easy."

Asami smirked a bit, then looked at me. "His attention will mostly be on her, but he might start eyeing you as well. Just be aware. You both are closer to the age he's interested in than I am."

I couldn't help another glance over my shoulder, and oh, he was definitely looking our way. "Yeah, I can tell," I said, leaning over and smiling as I talked. I could still feel his gaze, and suddenly, I didn't feel so bad about plotting his murder. "So if he does, should I try to turn him back to Mikaela, or should I play up the potential threesome?"

"Whichever you feel would be best in that moment." I saw a glimmer of something in Asami's eyes. "Remember, you're not bait being thrown to the wolves. You are the wolves, both of you."

Mikaela and I both smiled at that, and as our server was just coming back with refills for us, I picked mine up and toasted. "To being wolves."

Mikaela and Asami toasted with me, and once we were done, Mikaela and I hit the dancefloor again, migrating towards Sexton's side of the club. Under the lights, the music pumping, the press of bodies getting stronger as more people joined the floor, and for a time we just rode the wave of it, forgetting for a few moments what our mission was.

Of course, it swept over us again when Sexton came up to us. "Hello, ladies," he said. "Might I dance with you?"

Mikaela's eyes flickered red a moment, and she turned to him with a big smile and an obvious look up and down. "I would love to," she said, and started dancing again. Sexton smiled wider and started dancing as well. All his focus seemed to be on Mikaela, so I decided Option A would be my part of the plan.

And it definitely seemed to be working, cause Sexton didn't take his eyes off Mikaela the whole time we were on the floor. After several minutes, he invited Mikaela to get a drink with him at the bar, and as they walked away, I saw Mikaela's eyes now had a red ring in the center.

I was getting ready to follow them when one of Sexton's friends stepped in my path. "Hey baby, can I buy you a drink?"

"No, thank you," I said. "I'm DD tonight." I tried to slip past him, but he caught my arm.

"Oh, come on, baby, one drink won't hurt? I'll get you whatever you want."

"I said no, so kindly fuck off." I tried to pull away, but he was stronger and just pulled me in.

"You're too pretty for such a dirty mouth," he said, and I raised my hand in front of his throat to keep him back.

Almost before I could register it, he released me and Asami was standing there twisting his arm painfully.

"She said no, so back off." Her voice was a low growl that rivaled Michael's.

"Ow! Let go, bitch!" the man said, but Asami ignored him as she looked up at me.

"Are you alright, Jamie?" she asked me.

I nodded. "Yes, thanks to you."

I stayed there as one of the bouncers came over and Asami and I explained the situation, Asami applying a little more pressure when the guy tried to speak up. The bouncer then grabbed the guy and hauled him out of the club, as Asami put her arm around my shoulders.

"Are you alright?" she asked me.

I was shaking a little, but I nodded. "I am now. Thanks."

"Come on, let's go sit."

She walked me over to our booth and sat me down. Our server came by with some water and a tray of finger foods, which Asami made me nibble. The whole while we kept our eye on Mikaela, but she seemed to be doing quite well with Sexton. Any onlookers would just see a man and a young woman flirting and having a good time, that judging by the touches was going to lead to a hook up. A suspicion that looked like reality when the pair stood and headed out the door.

"Phase two," Asami said, and we stood to follow them. Luckily, thanks to how early we had arrived, it wasn't far to the Charger, and we were easily able to tail Mikaela and Sexton in his very nice Mercedes. Though, strangely enough, they weren't heading towards a residential area, but to a more deserted one.

"Fewer witnesses," Asami said when I questioned it. "And much easier to pin the blame on someone else. Michael probably gave Mikaela some tips."

The Mercedes finally stopped in an alley between two old buildings, one looking like a warehouse, the other a condemned apartment building. We parked just out of sight and, after Asami grabbed a bag from the back, followed at a distance as Mikaela led Sexton into the apartments.

She took him into one of the first floor rooms, and we watched from around the doorway as she tore open his shirt, shoved him into a chair and stepped back to unzip her dress.

"You're aggressive," Sexton said, trying to be suave, but there was a note of fear to it.

"I'm hungry," Mikaela said, and her voice had changed, raspy and deeper. "And you're on the menu."

Her dress dropped to the floor, and Sexton gave her a look down, then back up. Then his eyes widened and he started to scream as Mikaela lunged and latched onto his chest.

It was horrifying to watch, as Mikaela pulled back and ate the flesh she tore away, then dove back in for another bite. Blood spurted and spilled down to the floor, and Sexton screamed, though with how abandoned the area was, I doubted anyone would hear. At least not anyone who would call the cops. He had no chance of getting away, Mikaela had his wrists pinned. Trapped, scared and hopeless, like Mikaela had been.

Eventually, he gave one last wheeze, slumped, and fell silent. Mikaela didn't seem to notice, she just kept eating, and I looked to Asami.

Asami's expression was calm, probably having witnessed similar scenes more times than I wanted to imagine, though she glanced at me and her expression shifted to mild concern. "You all right, Alison," she asked softly.

"I-I think so." I looked back. "Should we…?"

"Let her finish. The more she eats now, the longer it'll be before she needs to hunt again."

I nodded and so we waited, until several minutes later, Mikaela stepped away from the body and turned to us. Her entire front was coated in blood, and her eyes blazed red in the dark.

"Thank you so much," _Libidine_ said, Glasgow grin in place, and started to rub over Mikaela's body. "Such a big man, can we have seconds?"

"You've had your fill for tonight. It's time to clean up and head home," Asami explained with the tone of a parent telling a young child it was bedtime.

 _Libidine_ pouted, but sighed. "As _Ira's_ mate wishes." The grin molded back to normal skin, and Mikaela shifted her stance, covering herself with her arms. She was breathing heavily, and started to turn back to the body.

I marched over and grabbed her head, keeping her from looking back. "No. Don't torture yourself. He's dead, and you're fed, and he's not going to hurt any girls ever again."

Mikaela looked down, refusing to meet my eyes. "How can you be so calm? I just ate a person! Right in front of you, and Asami. I look like- like this!" She gestured down at herself and tears leaked from her eyes. "And you're comforting me, like I'm not some monster."

"You are not a monster, Mikaela," I said. "You never can be. _Libidine_ is the monster, and you are its jailor, and that man was a monster for preying on innocents. The woman I love would never be a monster." And to prove my point, I leaned in and kissed her. I ignored the blood and the gore, and just poured my love for her into it. After a few moments, Mikaela wrapped her arms around me and reciprocated. We might have even done more than that had Asami not coughed loudly.

"While I can understand how you two are feeling, this is not the time or place." She opened the bag she held, and pulled out a ziplock that looked like it held washcloths. "Wipe yourself down, and I have a change of clothes in here." She tossed it to Mikaela, and then tossed another one to me. "Wipe down the body, erase any prints. We'll do the same with his car before we leave."

We did as she said, and in a half hour, the crime scene was as evidence free as we could make it. Before we left, Asami dropped a ziplock of papers onto the floor in front of Sexton. I could only make out part of a sentence, but what I saw read "Justice for", so I think I had an idea what that was, and couldn't help a smile.

In the Charger, Mikael and I sat wrapped up in the back seat, and Asami looked at us in the rearview. "We can talk more at the house. For now I only have one thing to tell you both." We both looked up and she smiled wanly. "Welcome to the pack."


	7. Chapter 6: Devil's Weapon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the late chapter, I was busy and when I remembered by boyfriend wouldn't let me out of bed to post. But, double chapter today though, and just in time for the spoopy day itself.

_And that was how it was. We went back to the farmhouse, and Bee and Michael were already back, and like Mikaela, he looked stronger and invigorated. In fact, we could hear how invigorated he was, as Bee, Mikaela and I rested in the spare room after Mikaela and I showered again._

_And from there, life settled into a new normal..._

We bid Asami and Michael goodbye the next morning, after another filling breakfast, and drove back home. Aside from a comment that Mikaela looked positively glowing, and some small questioning as to what we did over the weekend, we were left alone about it. We covered with a story about a volunteer program we had all signed up for that involved an overnight stay every two weeks, and Mikaela's hypnotism helped that lie gloss over well.

Bee, Mikaela, and I still went to school, as being killers and demons didn't mean we could just ignore our educations, and after class we stayed back for our sports and clubs. Bumblebee led the football team to State, though they got eliminated in the first round. Mikaela and the flag squad got second place in regionals. My eighteenth birthday passed, and I won the Literature Club's fall and winter writing competition. And every Friday night or Saturday morning, the three of us (or me and Mikaela, if the football team wouldn't let Bee go) drove down to Angel Falls for our occult studies.

Asami taught me more and more about witchcraft, and not just the parts that pertained to demonology. Books of herblore, astrology, and some minor spells and rituals all found their way from Asami's shelves to a case under my bed, and we'd taken to texting or calling everyday as I had questions about it. Mikaela and Bee occasionally joined us, but most of their study was training with Michael on how to control their powers, as well as being a consenting test dummy for some of Mikaela's.

In this time we learned that while Mikaela and Bee both had enhanced speed, strength, healing, and some senses (sight, hearing and smell), Mikaela's traits were stronger than Bee's. As well, she had her hypnosis, which grew stronger every time she used it, and to our great surprise, levitation. Michael revealed his abilities were the same shared by Bee and Mikaela, as well as a supernatural ability to read a person and sus out what will enrage them (and consequently how to generate other emotions), and a minor shadow manipulation, which he generally used to cause "accidents" based on that information.

Every two weeks, we would have a Hunt. Most of them were not near as high profile as that first one (which ended up on national news once Sexton's full crimes came out), and we didn't stick with the same groups either. One hunt, it'd be a girls night looking for a rapist in a club in Minneapolis, while Michael and Bee took out a pedophile in Hibbing, the next I'd play bait for Michael in Grand Rapids while Mikaela and Asami murdered a drug dealer in St Cloud. The one constant throughout it was that all our kills were disgusting and evil people the world was much better off without.

The months went by. Winter turned to spring, and with it came the preparations for college applications, exams, graduation, and most importantly to Bee, Mikaela and I, prom. We had planned to go last year, but I got sick with a bad stomach bug that morning, and Bee and Mikaela happily sacrificed their night to spend it nursing me back to health. By the start of April we had just about everything set for it, tickets being bought and outfits picked out.

I talked about this with Asami as she, Nemesis and I walked through the woods around the farmhouse. We were doing some herb gathering of plants that weren't in Asami's actual garden, and Nemesis was getting her walk at the same time.

"Sounds like you three are going to have a good time," Asami said, cutting some ivy off a tree trunk.

"I certainly hope so," I said, holding open the basket for her to put it in. "Did you go to your prom?"

"No. My father wouldn't allow it. I'm certain he only kept me in public school because he didn't have the time for homeschooling."

"Good for you he did. Things could have turned a-"

I was cut off as Nemesis started barking. We looked up to see her on the banks of the creek that ran through the woods. "What'd you find, girl?" Asami asked as we jogged over to see what was up.

The creek bed was unusually littered, with some half-disintegrated orange and white balls caught along the shore, and where Nemesis was standing, there was a large cluster of them caught on a branch. "Weird. Where did these come from?" I asked, kneeling down and reaching for one of the balls.

"They must have been dropped in from further upstream," Asami said, kneeling with me. "I feel like I've seen something like them before."

I shook off the one I had in my hand and stuffed it in the pocket of my windbreaker then reached for another one. Turning into a witch brought with it a sense of environmentalism, and the last thing we needed was for these to end up in the lake. Asami joined me, while Nemesis sat on the bank and watched.

However, a shock came when I cleared the cluster, and found a knife hidden by them. "Whoa." I picked it up, and it looked like an ordinary camping knife with a black handle - a Bowie I think - but something about it was making my skin crawl a bit. "How'd this end up out here?"

"That's strange," Asami said, and held her hand out for me to pass it to her. She looked it over. "It can't have been submerged long, it's practically immaculate. And of course, the water's washed away all prints, so no clue as to who dropped it."

"But why would someone want to drop a knife like this?" I asked.

"Evidence removal, most likely." She looked it over a bit more. "I might have a spell that could give a clue to the owner. I'll need to do a bit of looking through my books." She put the knife in the basket and we cleaned the rest of the balls before turning back to the house.

Turned out though she didn't need the spell after all. When we got back Michael, Mikaela and Bee were already back from their training, and when Asami set the knife on the table to unload the cuttings, Mikaela immediately jumped back out her chair, eyes wide and flickering blue and red.

"Where did you get that?" she asked, her voice fluctuating between her natural voice and _Libidine's_ husky tones. "Where did you get that!?"

"Whoa, whoa!" Bee went to her side, wrapping his arms around her. "Mik, what's wrong?"

"That- that's it. That's the knife Low Shoulder killed me with."

We all looked at the knife, and that crawling feeling came back to me, and I knew it was true. I had held Mikaela's murder weapon in my bare hands. I wanted to scrub them clean, like their evilness had seeped into the blade and was threatening to invade me.

"Where did you find this?" Michael asked.

"Nemesis found it, in the creek." Asami pulled out one of the half-dissolved balls. "It was surrounded by these."

"Wait, I think I recognize those." Bee held his hand out and Asami tossed it to him. He held it up and nodded. "These are some of those balls the scientists threw down the Kettle, to try and see where the water came out. Shane and a couple other guys on the team volunteered to help them out last summer, and he snagged a couple from the basket."

"But how did they end up out here?" I asked. "I mean, wouldn't they have figured out the creek is where the falls came out by now?"

"Except that the creek doesn't have a direct flow from the Kettle," Michael said. "It starts further north, and doesn't get stronger until it runs into the Devil's Track River."

"But-" Asami said. "I think I remember an old legend, from the Native Americans who lived in the area, that things lost in the Kettle would sometimes be found, years or months later, in the pools of the Angel Falls. I think one story was of a woman purposefully dropping a weapon down it, and years later, she found it in the Angel Falls, just in time to protect herself from an attack by enemies. I'll need to double check on that."

I had a realization that made me start grinning. "Wait, do you know what this means?" I asked, looking to Mikaela. "We have the murder weapon. We can break the possession now."

Mikaela's eyes flickered a solid red for a moment, before washing over with blue and she and Bee started to smile as well. "I can be free. I can be free!" She started to laugh, and Bee and I wrapped her in a tight hug as we started to as well. There were also some tears, and some jumping, and we probably looked quite silly, but we didn't care. We had a chance to end Mikaela's possession, to go back to a normal life. It was euphoric.

"Where's Low Shoulder playing next?" Bee asked once we'd calmed down enough to speak properly. "We should get them as soon as possible!"

"Before you three rush off to commit murder," Michael said, his voice cutting through our bubble a bit. "We'll need to make a proper plan. If you rush in, then you will likely be caught and that is the last thing any of us want."

"Right," Mikaela said, walking to the table and picking up the knife. "And I don't want them to get off easy. I want them terrified, helpless and hopeless. Just like they made me." She bared her teeth, and I could almost feel pity for Low Shoulder. They had no idea the storm coming their way.


	8. Chapter 7: Mikaela's Revenge

_We decided to plan our mission for sometime over the summer, when we'd have more time to prepare and put it in motion. Most kids spent their summer after senior year working or on vacation, but I'd long accepted we were far from normal. But those plans changed the moment Low Shoulder set foot on that stage…._

Bee left to get the knife, which we kept hidden in his car so our parents didn't question us on it. Meanwhile, Mikaela and I sat at a corner table, me in her lap and turned so it just looked like we were making out or cuddling, instead of her licking at my bite to seal it and murmuring comforting words in my ear. Words about how strong I would be and how I had tasted better than post-hunt sex.

I was grateful for the words, cause it hurt. It was like ice was running through my veins, making me shiver. And yet, as the cold seeped in and settled, I felt stronger than I'd ever been, and like I could run a marathon in a matter of moments.

"You're all healed over," Mikaela said, raising her head from my shoulder.

"Like I can take on the world and win," I said. "Especially with you and Bee on my side." I rested my forehead against hers, and we just sat like that for a long moment, until Bee came back with the knife.

"So when do we make our move?" he asked as I fixed the strap of my dress.

"Eleven," Mikaela said. "I have an idea."

After she explained it to us, we went back to join the crowd on the dance floor. We partied like we had no worries in the world, and while a couple people we knew gave us odd looks due to how vocal we'd been about hating Low Shoulder, they quickly brushed it off and went back to their own bubbles. And the whole time, Mikaela was at work, her eyes a swirl of blue and red as she wove a hypnotic spell over them all.

Five till eleven, I left the gym and went outside, running around the building to the outer door of the gym's stage, where Low Shoulder had come in. Backstage, there were a handful of stagehands, but with my new speed and strength, I took them down quick and quiet. One I used a bit too much force on and broke his clavicle, but he'd recover in time. I made my way to the catwalk's ladder.

"Dude, this sucks old man balls," the bassist whispered to Nikolai. Dirk, his name was, which I only knew because Mikaela had told about how he was the only one to have reservations about the sacrifice. Mikaela wanted to make him suffer for it.

"Shut up, it's good PR," Nikolai said, but he was too close to his mic and the whole gym heard it. Couples on the dance floor stopped to stare, and Nikolai quickly grabbed it. "I said 'It's good to be here!'"

The crowd cheered and fell back into their moments, not a single word of disquiet. That fucking deal of theirs at work, no doubt. I rolled my eyes and continued up the ladder. The catwalk was deserted, so I padded in stocking feet across the grating to the center spotlight. It, like the other middle ones, was focused on Nikolai, but that would soon change.

At eleven on the dot, Hosney got back on stage, holding two envelopes and two crowns. "Students," he said into the mic. "It's time now to crown our Prom King and Queen." The crowd cheered. "Nikolai Wolf will be reading out the winners, and then the Prom King and Queen will share a dance on stage." He handed the envelopes to Nikolai who nodded.

"Alright, Devil's Lake," he said. "Tonight, your Prom King is…" the drummer rolled and he pulled a card from the first envelope. "Ben Hummel!"

I turned the spotlight from the stage into the crowd, and found Bee where he was standing by the snack table. He smiled and waved and made his way to the stage, accepting his crown from Hosney.

"And the winner of Prom Queen is…" Another drum roll. "Mikaela Banes!"

I moved the spotlight to where Mikaela was standing in the center of the dance floor, and as one, all the students stepped aside, forming an aisle straight to the stage for her.

Mikaela had her back to the stage, but now she turned around, affecting a sweet smile. "Hello, Nikolai. Remember me?"

And oh, he did. They all did, if the way Low Shoulder all looked to each other said anything, let alone the amount of fear rolling off of them. Dirk actually took a step back, though he didn't get far before bumping into Bee's foot.

"Dude, isn't that-?" he started to ask, but a gesture from Nikolai cut him off.

"I'm sorry, but I can't say I do," Nikolai said smoothly. "We have so many fans, especially from this town. But why don't you come up here to accept your crown and we can get to know each other."

"Really?" Mikaela started stalking towards the stage. "You don't remember the night at Maccadam's? I got you and the band drinks; you ordered a Kettle Black."

"Oh! Yes, I remember now," Nikolai said. "And we helped you out of the fire, along with those other people."

"Yes, you helped me out of the fire. And when I tried to go off to find my boyfriend and girlfriend, you grabbed me and dragged me into your van." The crowd, still awake under the hypnotic spell, started muttering amongst themselves. But almost immediately, the tone shifted from "Oh God!" and "You poor thing" to "Dirty slut!" and "I bet she liked it, all five at once". Whether that was Low Shoulder's deal or just teenage bitterness, I couldn't tell.

Undeterred, Mikaela continued. "When my loves tried to follow you to save me, you dropped a box of glass bottles out the back of the van so their tires would pop, and you took me out to the Kettle. I tried to run, but you caught me and gagged me and carried me to the falls." She was almost to the stage now. "You tied me to a stump, and pledged my life to Satan in exchange for riches, fame, and fortune." She stopped and rested a hand against her stomach, trailing it up her torso. "I have thirteen scars that will never go away. Six to the stomach. Six to the chest." Her hand stopped over her heart. "One to my heart. I'm surprised you didn't go for the full '666'."

Nikolai looked to Dirk and Hosney, and gave a very fake sounding laugh. "Okay, a very funny story, but there's one problem. If we killed you six months ago, then how are you alive to stand here and tell it?"

"Because, Nikolai, you made a mistake." Mikaela rose off the floor, and a wave of gasps swept through the gym. "I was not a virgin. So when the devil realized it, he made me a deal of my own." She rushed forward, and lifted Nikolai off the stage by his throat, as her face morphed into a Glasgow grin. "Your life, for mine back!"

Someone screamed, and Bee and I acted. Bee snapped Dirk's knee with a sharp kick as I leapt down from the catwalk, landing on top of the drummer. Several sickening cracks sounded out. I felt a jolt of pain in my left leg, but as I stood and lunged for the keyboardist, it disappeared. I caught the man's arm and twisted it behind him. My hand gripped the back of his neck as I pressed him against his keyboard. The second guitarist went down with Bee's arm around his throat.

"Miss Banes, Mr Hummel, what are you doing!?" Hosney yelled, but Mikaela turned and growled at him, her eyes pure red now and everyone could see her _Libidine_ appearance.

"Leave. Now!" She turned fully to the crowd, her voice filling with the full force of her hypnotic power. "Tell no one what you have seen, and you will live. Now GO!"

The whole crowd, teacher and student alike, fled out the doors, a stampede of dresses and suits. In mere minutes, the gym was completely deserted except for us and Low Shoulder.

Mikaela dropped Nikolai to the floor before floating down herself. "You are damn lucky I need you intact in order to free myself." She grabbed his collar and dragged him to a large tree cut out at the back of the stage. "So you'll just have to watch as we tear your bandmates apart."

"How do you want to do this, Mikaela?" Bee asked.

She ripped the strings off Nikolai's guitar and started to string him up to the tree. "Nikolai and Dirk are mine. You and Alison can split the other three how you want."

"I like the sound of that," I said, glaring down at my captive

"What the fu- AHH!" he screamed as I snapped his wrist.

"Shut the fuck up. You can't say you don't deserve this."

"No, God, please no!" Dirk whimpered from where he had fallen, clutching his shattered knee. "Please, it wasn't- The other guys planned the sacrifice. I didn't to, I just-"

"You just went along with it, because you wanted to be Maroon 5," Mikaela cut him off, turning from Nikolai and stalking across the stage to him. She had one of the strings still in her hands, spinning it like a jump rope. "'It's not my fault', you say? Well you both deserve what's coming now, so don't say a fucking word." She wrapped the string around his mouth, pressing it tight enough it drew blood.

Bee and I left Mikaela to it, and focused on our members. I looked over at the drummer, but he was already dead, his drumstick driven through his throat and his body twisted in such a way he probably had broken bones. Lucky him, he got the easy death.

I threw the keyboardist to the ground and stomped on his knees, then his elbows, so he couldn't fight back or move. Then, I unleashed hell on him.

Our Hunts were always about feeding Mikaela and Michael, and aside from a few times I had to fight off a pushy non-target, only they got to rip into someone. Six months is a long time for silent rage to build up in a person, and once it was let loose, it was unstoppable, and all our victims could do was scream.

I ripped his hair out. I clawed his face to shreds. I carved up his chest and caved in his ribs. I ripped out his throat with my fingers. When I was done, he looked more like a lump of human shaped flesh in clothes than a person. My face, hands, and dress were coated in blood. I'd never felt so satisfied.

I turned around to see the others. Bee had taken off his suit jacket and rolled up his sleeves before stringing the guitarist up like a punching bag and using him as such. His fists were as bloody as my own, though he wasn't as splattered. The guitarist was unrecognizable, his face red and purple and swollen, while his arms had blood trailing down from his binds.

Bee and I locked eyes, and a moment later we met in the middle of the stage, wrapped up and lips locked. The rush of emotion, it was indescribable and the only way to express it was physically. We didn't lose ourselves in it, but for several moments, our world was arms and lips. When we finally did part, we didn't say a word, just looking for Mikaela, and what she had done to Dirk was a tableau worthy of Hannibal Lector.

Dirk's face was locked in his final scream, his eyes staring unseeing at the ceiling. Blood trailed from the sides of his mouth from around the guitar string bit. His arms lay at unnatural angles, so he had no defense. His torso was sliced open, and around his body, his insides sat. Stomach, intestines, kidneys, liver, spleen, lungs, and heart, shown for all the world to see. Yet somehow, Mikaela managed to keep her clothes clean, the only blood being on her arms.

She turned to us, and while she had _Libidine's_ face, we knew this was purely Mikaela in there. "Four down, one to go. May I have the knife?"

Bee nodded, and retrieved the knife from his jacket pocket. Mikaela took it, and together we walked over to Nikolai.

He was tied with his arms outstretched and his legs together, like J.C. Or rather, like Mikaela when we had found her. His front and the floor in front of him was splattered with vomit, and he was staring at us with abject horror in his tear reddened eyes.

"Please, please…" He whispered, his voice ragged and hoarse.

"Funny," Mikaela said. "That's what I said."

She didn't give him a chance to answer, before she plunged the bowie knife into his gut. She ripped it out, and stabbed it in again.

Rip, stab, scream, rip. Stab, scream, rip. Stab, scream, rip. Stab, scream, rip.

She moved up to his chest.

Stab, scream, rip. Stab, scream, rip. Stab, scream, rip. Stab, scream, rip. Stab, scream, rip. Stab, scream, rip.

She stopped for a moment, stepping back to hold the knife with both hands. "With deepest malice, I sacrifice this prick unto thee. Have fun feasting on his soul." Then she plunged the knife directly into his heart. But she didn't stop there. She drew the knife out just slightly, and sliced open his chest, reaching into the cut and pulling out his heart. It was still beating, and Mikaela held Nikolai's gaze as she bit into it.

The first bite tore it in half, and Nikolai's body slumped. The second half disappeared into Mikaela's mouth, and she smiled, her face morphing back to normal. Then she hunched over, dropping the knife and clutching her chest.

"Mikaela!" Bee and I grabbed her arms, holding her up, and for a moment I feared that the ritual failed, or that it would take her along with the demon.

But instead, she just hacked up more of the spiny black goo that she'd released when she first was possessed. Only this time, the sludge moved on its own, and rose up to form a humanoid shape.

"Well, that was fun while it lasted," _Libidine_ said. "You've successfully exorcised me, while also giving me some wonderful subjects to torment in Hell. I would have liked to stay longer, but the rules are the rules. Congratulations." It bowed its "head" to us, then sank back into a pool on the ground.

We didn't move or say anything for a long moment. Then Mikaela looked at us with her baby blue eyes, and we realized…. We did it. We were free.

We laughed, semi-hysterically, and clung tight to each other, kisses exchanged between bursts of it. It had to have been several minutes before we calmed down enough for any kind of rational thought.

"So what do we do now?" I asked.

"We can't stay here," Bee said. "I'm surprised the cops haven't shown up."

"I think it was my hypnotism," Mikaela said. "I told them not to tell anyone. But with _Libidine_ gone, I don't know if it will hold."

"We'll have to go on the run," I said. "Leave Devil's Kettle and get as far away as we can before the news breaks."

"Good thing we still have our overnight bags in the Camaro," Bee said. "We'll find somewhere to lay low, and figure it out from there."

"Sounds like a plan." Mikaela took our hands in hers. "Let's get out of here."

We walked out of the gym together, as the scoreboard clock on the wall changed over to 12:00, a dark mirror of when we arrived only four hours before. But to our great surprise, we were not greeted outside by a fleet of cop cars, or even an empty lot. Instead, we found Michael and Asami, standing next to their Charger, with Nemesis sticking her head out the back window. Michael gave us a serious nod, while Asami offered a smile.

"Need a ride?" she asked.

All three of us smiled back, and took a step towards them.

**THE END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here is Mikaela's Body. There are some more ideas for this universe, so expect to see more in the future. But for now, this is what I have and I'm getting ready for a wedding, so I bid you all goodbye for now, and Happy Halloween!


End file.
